Process of scouring wool.



PETER SGHMID, OF BASEL, SWITZERLAND.

rnoonss or SCOURING WOOL.

No Drawing.

Specification of Letters Patent.

Application filed January 4, 1910.

PatentedJ an. 10, 1911.

Serial No. 536,361.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that 1, PETER SoHMID, a citizen of the Swiss Republic, andresident of Basel, Switzerland, have invented a new and useful Processfor Scouring Wool, of which the following is a full, clear, and exactspecification.

The scouring of wool in form of flocks, fleeces, slivers, threads, webs,cloths, networks, knittings etc., as hitherto carried out, is based onthe treatment of the wool with a cold or hot, alkaline or soapy, liquidbath. This treatment of the wool with a liquid bath has certaindisadvantages which can be avoided by my present improvement, whichconsists in substituting for the liquid bath at present employed a bathor lather of soapy water which may or may not contain an alkali, analkaline salt or other known scouring ingredient.

In order to prepare such a lather bath, an aqueous soapy solution isintroduced into a scouring vessel, or vat, provided at its bottom with aheating coil, the said solution being then heated to the boiling pointby feeding the said coil with steam, or other heating agent, capable ofmaintaining the soapy solution in ebullition. The upper part of the vator vessel will thus be filled up with a lather bath, which will remain,or be maintained, as long as the heating of the soapy solution iscontinued. The wool to be scoured is manipulated in this lather bath, orconducted through this latter, in such a manner that it cannot come intocontact with the soapy liquid. This latter may have the sameconcentration as the liquid scouring baths at present used and contain,besides the soap, other scouring ingredients.

To carry out the new scouring process, for" instance for scouring woolslivers, the apparatus shown in the accompanying drawing may beemployed.

a is an open scouring vat or vessel provided at its bottom with aheating-coil 5, covered by the liquid of the scouring bath 0. The upperpart of the vat or vessel or, contains a large number of rotatablerollers d, 6, over which the wool slivers g to be scoured are conducted,in a slow movement, through the lather f formed above the bath 0 andfilling the upper part of the vat a.

The above described use of a scouring bath in the form of lather offersthe following advantages: 1. The felting of the goods is considerablyreduced, hence lather baths can be employed, which have a highertemperature than the liquid bath at present employed, and consequentlythe duration of the treatment can be shortened. 2. When cloths,knittings, threads or slivers etc. are scoured their treatment with alather bath removes less wool down therefrom, than when they are treatedwith a liquid. 3. When dyed cloths, knittings, threads or slivers arescoured with a lather bath, the dyed materials will lose less of theirfreshness and'of their vividness than when they are treated with aliquid bath.

The transformation of the soapy scouring liquid bath into lather may beaided by injecting finely divided air under pressure into the liquidsoapy solution contained in the vator vessel.

What I claim is:

l. The herein described process of scouring wool, consisting in firstmaking a scouring bath containing soap, then treating the wool with thelather only of the said bath, the wool not being submerged in the bath,and finally washing the wool thus treated.

2. The herein described process of scouring wool, consisting in firstmaking a scouring bath containing soap, then treating the wool with thelather only of the said bath obtained by heating said bath to'theboiling point inthe presence of air, the-wool not being submerged in thebath, and finally washing the wool thus treated.

3. The herein described process of scouring wool, consisting in firstmaking a scouring bath containing soap, then treating the wool withthelather only of the said bath obtained by heating said bath to theboiling point and injecting air in said bath, the wool not beingsubmerged in the bath, and finally washing the wool thus treated.

In witness whereof I have hereunto signed my name this 22d day ofDecember 1909, in the presence of two subscribing witnesses.

PETER SCHMID.

Witnesses:

GEO. Girronn, AMAND Rims.

